Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of the NWT Housing Corporation. I was asking the Minister questions last week regarding the large number of home ownership units remaining vacant because people don’t fit program criteria. At my constituency meeting in Detah, I was told one applicant was turned down because their income exceeded the $77,000 income ceiling for program eligibility. That seems to lack realism. Suppose a household made $80,000, would they be any more able to buy a home in the private market in Detah? Some flexibility obviously is needed here.

The...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister knows full well that environmental remediation is a topic of the devolution negotiations. Out of the demolition of the roaster, possibly the most lethally toxic building in all of Canada, the adjoining stack contains 14 tonnes of arsenic trioxide that’s permeated with arsenic asbestos and other hazards. No news release, no media briefing, no explanatory advertising, no community information meetings, no attempts to inform the public and allay concerns for human health and environmental safety in this announcement. They just don’t learn.

When will this...

The Minister, obviously, isn’t addressing the questions here. There has certainly been debate for many, many years. The public has had a hard time and eventually got these hearings and made their views known. Now, as a government, we should be recognizing those. This statement doesn’t.

Again, I’ve made the point in past statements that it would, almost certainly, if it was a new mine, be governed by a legally binding environmental management agreement such as we see for the diamond mines, transboundary water agreements, and so on. The Giant Mine Project is far from new. It’s a toxic legacy of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I also would like to recognize the students taking the course on Canadian Social Welfare Policy, Kelly and Jacq. I would also like to recognize the instructor Susan Fitzpatrick, a resident of Weledeh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to table a letter to Mr. Richard Edjericon, chairperson of the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board, from Ms. Joanna Ankersmit, AANDC; and Ray Case, GNWT; on the Giant Mine remediation project closing comments. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Just by way of example here, I’ve just got an e-mail here today, mentioning a home ownership unit in Enterprise that sat empty for three years. It has frozen at least twice and has mould in the basement. A person visited Providence recently and the night watchman device was shining brightly, meaning again there was no heat in the unit and it was probably frozen up. Apparently, Fort Resolution has 16 home ownership units vacant. We know about my situation in Detah. Obviously, we need that flexibility in policies.

Can the Minister assure me that we will be not just reading...

Thanks to the remarks from the Minister there. When we talk about getting people into housing, we’re often talking about getting them out of homelessness. The Housing First Movement I’ve referred to in the past points out the dramatic decrease in government’s other service costs. When we meet the lower costs of providing housing, you avoid emergency issues and so on. We need to look at the big picture.

Can the Minister say how the Housing Corporation includes in its analysis of policy, for example, such as we’re discussing the financial benefits of reduced costs of other services when people...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to return to oral questions.

---Unanimous consent granted

Can I get confirmation that the Minister said the department will be developing a policy for non-government organizations’ infrastructure that we would consider contributing to? Not just to a Children First sort of structure but an NGO structure.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I wanted to just first maybe get an update on what the situation is with the renovations to the museum. I know there have been a few kerfuffles lately, and I know that the work is being done by Public Works and Services perhaps, or they’re involved. I know there were some toxic materials found and I think the situation there is now under control, but I don’t see it in this budget. So I think the hope is that we’re going to get that addressed this fiscal year. So could I just get that confirmed?

I know a lot of people would like to see the museum fully functional again...